Remedy
by Xyliette
Summary: Cheap tequila, one night stands and bad decisions lead to the most interesting thing either one of them has ever experienced, a functional relationship. Mark/Cristina.


A/N: Sometimes I get really wacky ideas and I can't write anything that I already have going until I get it out. These are not normally characters I dabble in so please forgive me if I have pulled them grotesquely out of character. And...um, I probably just ate shit on my French test because I chose to write this instead of studying so drop me a line and tell me how damn crazy I am for this. It'd be much appreciated. Enjoy-  
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This is how it started. He was waiting on someone else and she was drinking so that it wouldn't hurt to breathe.

**_-----_**

She gave him that look. The look that said, _'find me later…'_ so should it really be his fault that he is scouring Joe's trying to track down Erica and Callie? Shrugging his black leather coat off his shoulders and shaking the rain from his short hair he makes his way to the bar before taking the appropriate stool and ordering the usual.

It's nice to be able to drift into a spot and have the bartender already pouring your drink before you can even mutter out the choice, maybe a little pathetic but nice just the same. His glance drifts over the rim of the cup waiting impatiently for the duo to show. Surely they'll show up. He sees Derek in the corner with some brunette that is probably Rose but god only knows because his friend's "dating standards" hit an all time low with Sydney. To her credit though, he thinks, at least she dumped Derek before she figured out how fucked up he is. Next to the dart board he spots Karev and decides that, if he needs it, that can be his back up plan. Erica likes darts. He scans the room again before feeling someone slide in next to him.

"Heard you saved Bailey's baby today, sounds like those hands of yours may need a massage and lucky for you I know just the guy." He starts with a sly smirk before seeing who is actually there.

"Shut up Sloan. Joe! I need something." Cristina mutters. After spending a whole day holding Tuck's hand and denying herself one the best surgical opportunities she has ever been offered by "The Hahn" she needs to drink and she needs to drink heavily. Going unnoticed by the busy man behind the counter she deftly swipes her bar mate's drink and gulps it back.

"Yang." He growls before she slams the empty glass back down in front of his hands. "Joe!" He shouts over the growing multitude. Unusually crowded he looks to the door again this time seeing George slump his way through the people and pour himself into a booth. No Erica, yet.

"Stop your whining." She argues before delicately standing on her stool and stepping onto the bar. Giving a little wink she lifts a bottle of tequila, (because beer is not going to cut it tonight), from the shelf and quickly turns back to her seat before the group can cheer her into doing a little dance. Not that dancing sounds bad right now. She adds it to the list of things to do after a few more shots and then realizes that she hasn't heard from Meredith in hours and Derek is apparently on another date, of course in the same place her person frequents. It wouldn't be fun if he didn't torture her in every way possible. "Men." She grumbles letting everyone else's problems roll off her shoulders and nearly chokes when the bitter alcohol bites at her throat. She'll deal with the fall out tomorrow, tonight she needs to forget.

"I'm taking offense to that remark." He calls before snatching the bottle away from her and pouring himself a glass. He's not big on tequila but one drink is as good as any other for his purpose of loosening up.

"Do whatever you want with it." She calls careening her neck and stretching out her arms.

His eyes accidentally fall to the bit of shoulder her shirt shows off and then trail down the line of her shirt. "Stop staring." She demands rolling her eyes.

"If you can say whatever you want then I can look wherever I want." He quips and for a second he thinks he may get slapped and not in the cute kind of way that Addison used to slap him when she was frustrated with herself. Something more closely related to the red mark inducing, stinging kind of slap you get when you really piss a woman off and they are trying not to beat the shit out of you for mistakenly sleeping with their daughter or sister…not that he would know or anything.

"I'm not screwing you."

"I didn't ask you to." He reminds her as he checks her out again. She's got a dancer's body he muses tipping his head toward his drink.

"I'm just saying stop looking because you aren't getting any of this." She motions to her dark jeans and then lets her hand drift into the air as the bottle meets her lips again.

"Fine with me." He snorts at her asinine idea and turns back to watch Karev get his ass kicked by an overly jubilant Izzie.

"You wouldn't be able to handle this." Cristina rattles off behind his back clearly well on her way to sloshed.

He turns back with his head tilted to the side. "I'd be the best you ever had Yang. You'd be begging me to stop."

"Please. I've heard of your conquests."

"Anyone have any complaints? I take my craft very seriously." At least serious enough to realize that he's not getting any younger and the time on the clock isn't ticking off fast enough to make his unknowing date show up.

She hasn't heard anyone ever say anything, at least not that she can remember lately. Gossip is only fun when it doesn't involve her getting left in a wedding dress and having Burke's godforsaken mother show up at her place of employment. "Well-"

"That's what I thought." He cuts her off hastily and lets his posture slump a little. "You look…sad." He notes finishing off his glass of shitty alcohol and pouring another. He can't even recall a time when drinking two dollar tequila was a good idea. Oh well, he's just buying time after all.

"I'm not sad." She scoffs. "I don't do sad." She doesn't do any emotion if she can help it.

"Right." And for the first time the bad lighting catches her face in such a way that he actually sees a person instead of the famed operating robot or whatever it is they call her.

Then there's this uncomfortable pause. One that, had they ever really spoken outside of the hospital doors, wouldn't be present. All he knows is she was engaged to that one guy and shares some particular feelings about the field of ortho. "You can tell me." He offers quietly. No one has really talked to him lately except Derek and Derek never says anything important not to mention the fact that he is still on friend probation for ruining his life. It's thin ice to wander around on. "It's not like anyone ever believes what I say."

"That's true."

And if he didn't know better he would have said she giggled just then. But she covered it with a cough and another rapid shot completely drowning out the sound. "What are you doing here without your other half anyway?"

"I do things without Meredith."

"Uh-huh."

"I do." And now he's got her thinking but she's tired of thinking because it isn't getting her anywhere closer to where she wants to be in life. She's tired of holding a baby's hand just to prove a fucking point to everyone and she's tired of missing Burke and substituting Meredith in where he once would have been. "What are you doing here? Shouldn't you be conning one of the nurses into thinking you are under forty?"

"I am under forty." Barely but it doesn't matter because she's a little feisty and in his experience aggressiveness and alcohol have very good outcomes. "I'm kinda hoping Erica shows up." He relents taking a steady stream of liquor past his lips and swishing it through his teeth before swallowing heavily.

"Hahn? Oh, you don't have a chance in hell."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence Yang. I'll be sure to remember that when it comes time for you to be on my service. How do you feel about bedpans?" He's still her boss in a round about way, he's gotta use it.

"Don't punish me for being…honest." This time she giggles, almost laughs because Burke was honest most of the time, when he wasn't screwing with her head and screwing her over and she is so drained from attempting not to think about him it's ridiculous. Everything comes back to him, everything reminds her of him and it's the most bizarre thing she has ever experienced. "I'm kind of looking to get laid tonight." She calls out too loud, the droplets of tequila starting to play their role in the conversation. "Not with you." She tells him as he suggestively raises his brow.

"Your loss."

"Yeah, and that's why the nurses are on Sloan Strike '07?"

"Maybe I'm on Nurse Strike '07 and they are retaliating to save face."

Throwing her hair back she shakes her head out a little before taking another gulp and realizing that she would rather ignore the prospect of getting laid by a freaky stranger that she will have to kick out of her bed in the early morning hours. And if she had to be honest with herself, which she really hates these days, she'd have to admit that she isn't ready to drag another man into the apartment she once shared with Preston. Getting smashed is a good enough alternative. "She's not going to show."

"You don't know that." And for the hundredth time his eyes fall to the opening door only to be disappointed again.

"Uh, yes I do."

"How?" He asks growing weary of her running commentary on his life's events.

"She's way out of your league and clearly not interested. Haven't you been asking her out for the last two weeks? Take a hint idiot." And finishes with a "speak for yourself" mentally when all of the shift switching comes into play and she realizes that she should be taking a hint and finding a new specialty like Callie suggested…fuck it.

"Hey who at this bar got left in a wedding dress in the back of a church? Yeah, that would be you so just zip it. You don't know what my league even is."

The wedding jokes got old after her first day on "their" honeymoon, even if she was the one making them then. Thank god for Meredith and alcohol…and room service. "I know your type."

"Yang, shut up."

"No, you think that if you screw enough women you will never be lonely…news flash, you already are." He turns his ears off as she continues to babble on informing him that he must miss the flaming red head that ran away from his precious sixty day plan by fucking Karev not so carefully, getting caught and then fleeing to the beach. He doesn't want to hear about Addison. Twenty seconds later his tongue is swirling around her lazy mouth stifling the sounds.

He pulls back angered by her incessant feedback on the reasons why he should be miserable. "I don't want to talk about Addison, can you follow that? We ended things; she moved on, I'm moving on." Or something like that.

"By trying to bed Hahn!" She shouts before he drags her into the corner booth and tries to occupy her with the change in scenery. Reaching for his coat he draws the zipper up slowly trying to figure out it he should brave the waters and see if Erica does show or get the hell out before Yang decides she needs to switch to being on the psych floor. He opts for the latter and excuses himself while she throws back the bottle and nonchalantly waves him off like he was never there at all.

**_-----_**

This is how it went down.

He wasn't expecting her to call, hell he didn't even know she had his number and now as he slams her into the wall while she tugs on his belt insistently, he isn't sure how she would have gotten his number.

After the short cab ride back to his hotel/home he sulked in the lobby bar for an hour not managing to pick up anything good and sauntered back to his room alone. A quick shower and a phone call later and there she was. Lust filled, drunk and pulling his pants down and slipping her hand inside of his boxers. He's been with a few women, well more than a few but it's been way too long, (because to her credit Addison really did break him) and the way she is stroking him makes him want to come right then and there. She demands something but he cuts her short by attacking her mouth and pulling them from the wall and throwing her onto the well used mattress.

There's a fight for dominance and eventually he gives in when she rolls them for the fourth time straddling his lap and pinning his hands as high as she can reach. She positions herself before slamming down onto him and eliciting a growl that he is certain she has never heard the likes of before. She tosses her head from side to side, digs her short nails into the flash of his arms and moans like she hasn't been laid in years.

Enjoying his point of view and thinking of anything but what they are doing right now, at least until she comes first, he tries to remember if he ever felt attracted to her. Undoubtedly he is never one to deny any woman a good romp in the sack but Cristina Yang? Not something he ever considered. She wasn't even a blip on his radar. In retrospect, as she swirls her hips grinding into him harder and he strokes her clit testing her endurance, he thinks he should've been trying for this all along. He feels her tighten around him, feels her pick up the pace and hears the scream caught in her throat. Her eyes flutter closed as the waves crash down and when she mutters out a strangled, "Mark!" she feels him explode.

Heaving she rolls onto her side, shirking away from what she is positive will be the worst mistake of her life, and pulling the comforter up around her until she can catch her breath and her legs stop quivering long enough for her to stand upright. Maybe there is something to sleeping with Mark Sloan. At least she remembered the right name to yell she thinks as her eyes drag to a close and she feels a strong arm tug her back. Seconds later, fighting sleep, she finds herself trapped in the very uncomfortable and precarious position that is cuddling with Mark Sloan. She didn't figure him for a touch-er but as his breathing slows and deepens she decides that alcohol is a viable enough excuse and lets the heavy tormented sleep come.

**_-----_**

This is how they played the game of avoidance.

She snuck out of his grip, wriggling into her dirty wrinkled clothes and dashed from the door hours later. She let herself think it was a one time slip up. She let herself carry on in his presence like nothing ever happened. It worked for about three days. Now they meet in on-call rooms, empty showers, closets, hotel rooms, offices and cars. And at first it was a nice arrangement. It was simple, clean, no strings attached, good old fashioned fuck buddies. He would show up at the bar every night and sometimes she was there, sometimes she wasn't. Sometimes she came home with him; sometimes she paged him to a room. Sometimes they didn't even use alcohol as a precursor and sometimes she let him be in control. It was what they needed even if neither was going to admit it.

He smirked the second time she followed him up to his room after a week of pretending he didn't exist. Felt masculine in his abilities to have her coming back for more but there was always something in the end that made him wrap his arm around her hip and breathe in her light sterile scent before heading to unconsciousness. Maybe, as he likes to think, he hit that stage in life where it is acceptable to do a little post coital snuggling. Maybe he's gone soft or maybe it's just habit now (something to add to the list of reasons why he hates Addison). Or perhaps it's her. Tough as nails, no fun, no games, robot Cristina Yang has his heart beating a little faster and his smile a little wider. He's not mentioning it though, why screw up the only thing he has going on?

**_-----_**

This is how it got its name.

At some point meaningless sex turned into sex and conversation and now she actually stays for breakfast (which in her world is a pot of coffee) instead of skipping out the door in the early waking hours. They don't discuss them, because as she put it so eloquently, there is no them. Her friends think she is off pining over Burke and Derek couldn't care less about who Mark is sleeping with this week or two months and three days…not that he's counting.

Not that he's noticing this is the most functional he's ever been in a relationship since the start of his dating career. He doesn't do that. Just like she doesn't actually think that living in a hotel for the rest of her life could have some upsides. No washing of things, no cleaning and no cooking but she doesn't think about it because if she thought about it then they would have things in common.

She sticks to the safe topics. Surgery, her vague understanding of sports and alcohol. Sometimes they talk med school. He doesn't bring up Addison, she doesn't bring up Burke. They live in a bubble. In a bubble where it's okay to use each other for sex because they are hurting. In a warm place that is slowly turning into something neither one of them ever considered when this began that one night in a bar.

**_-----_**

This is how it progressed.

One day Derek asked Mark what the fuck was up with the bounce in his step and told him that he should consider a therapist. He smirked, smacked his friend on the back, announced he was the best he had ever been and danced his ass down the hallway waiting for the moment his pager would sound. It did. She did. And he told her to just move in already because it was logical and he was damn tired of wasting his nights away in a bar when he could be at "home" waiting for her.

One night Callie asked Cristina where the hell she had been. She laughed and slammed the door to her room blatantly ignoring the topic. Minutes later she emerged with a small bag over her shoulder and announced she was going out. As far as Callie can remember she hasn't been back in two weeks.

**_-----_**

This is how it came to be.

He doesn't buy jewelry, she doesn't wear it. He doesn't know where a florist is even located in this rain puddle of a town, she's allergic anyway. He doesn't remember traditional holidays; she's Jewish and couldn't care less. He'd make a horrible father, she hates kids. He still flirts with everything that can wear a skirt; she doesn't make eye contact with him at work. He's not cheating and she's not asking. It's functional on the highest levels of dysfunction and as he threads his fingers through hers and leads her to the couch for "movie night" (surgical tapes stolen from Meredith's living room) he knows this was the smartest decision he never made.

Thank god for shitty two dollar tequila and one night stands.

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End file.
